A Small Historical Opening Theory Find And Some Thoughts From The Time.

Good afternoon everyone!!

Last time round I mentioned that the idea of Qb3 in the Queen's Gambit had been played previously by Steinitz. By a strange coincidence I was looking at something this week which probably explains where he got the idea from!! 

Browsing through The Chess Player's Quarterly Chronicle of 1869, as you do if you are as dull as I am, I came across a fascinating little article. So I will reproduce it here, along with the games and Lowenthal's comments from the time. I think the views expressed are interesting in the context of how openings were seen at the time.

It is not clear whether the games were finished by correspondence or over the board. From the games and the wording of Lowenthal's article I would guess the latter, but that is just a speculation.

Apart from Schlen I know about all the players. One interesting name which my long time readers will know about is von Feierfeil, the man who almost 20 years later almost changed chess history.

On the Berlin team was this man

who I have written a fun blog about.

Let's get to the games, with Lowenthal's annotations. Firstly the Queen's Gambit in question. A couple of interesting bits in the notes. Firstly ...Nbd7 being a 'new move'. I wonder what the history behind that comment was!? Secondly the comment on Bg5. 26 years later Gunsberg wrote in the same way about the move in the Hastings Tournament Book.

Steinitz - living in London at the time - would definitely have seen this game, and a few years later played Bg5 himself, and all those years later, tried out the Qb3 idea in a number of games.

Note the correction to my own analysis thanks to the comments below! Cheers mate!

The other game - with Vienna as White opened with - as you would expect from a team led by its' inventor

The Vienna - or 'Hampe Opening' as it was named above. The comment to 2...Nc6 is interesting in itself, as 2 years previously - around the time that the game started - Steinitz famously introduced his Gambit, in a game against Neumann at the Dundee tournament.

Two pictures to end with.

Victor Knorre was a fascinating figure! He came from a family of Ukrainian - Russian astronomers, and moved to Berlin in the early 1860's to persue a career in that field. one of that group - along with Schallop - who formed the base of chess strength in Berlin, which was to become - like Vienna - one of the main centres of chess strength in the world.

And Carl/Karl Mayet. One of the original 'Pleiades' along with Bilguer et al. One of the participants in the first International Tournament - London 1851.He died during the course of the games given here, as noted by Lowenthal, in 1868. I have a better version of this picture somewhere, but this one will do!

That's it for today. I hope you enjoyed this little look into the chess thinking of a century and a half ago! Take care everyone.